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. 2022 Mar 15;22(1):341.
doi: 10.1186/s12913-022-07600-7.

Acceptability and feasibility of HIV recent infection surveillance by healthcare workers using a rapid test for recent infection at HIV testing sites - Malawi, 2019

Melissa M Arons  1 , Kathryn G Curran  2 , Malango Msukwa  3 , Joe Theu  3 , Gabrielle O'Malley  4 , Alexandra Ernst  5 , Ireen Namakhoma  3 , George Bello  3   6 , Carson Telford  2 , Vedapuri Shanmugam  2 , Bharat Parekh  2 , Evelyn Kim  7 , Trudy Dobbs  2 , Danielle Payne  7 , Salem Gugsa  4
Affiliations

Acceptability and feasibility of HIV recent infection surveillance by healthcare workers using a rapid test for recent infection at HIV testing sites - Malawi, 2019

Melissa M Arons et al. BMC Health Serv Res. .

Erratum in

Abstract

Background: The Malawi Ministry of Health implemented a new surveillance activity in April 2019 to detect recent HIV infections using a rapid test for recent infection (RTRI) to identify areas of ongoing transmission and guide response activities.

Setting: At 23 health facilities in Blantyre District, healthcare workers (HCWs) were trained to conduct recent infection testing. In September 2019, we conducted a cross-sectional survey at these sites to explore the acceptability and feasibility of integrating this activity into routine HIV testing services (HTS).

Methods: Research assistants interviewed HCWs using a semi-structured survey. Descriptive statistics were used to summarize quantitative responses and thematic analysis was used to group open-ended text.

Results: We interviewed 119 HCWs. Eighty-two percent of participants reported the RTRI was easy-to-use. HCWs perceived high client acceptability; 100% reported clients as 'somewhat' or 'very accepting'. Challenges included 68% of HCWs estimating they spend ≥20 min beyond routine HTS per client for this activity and 51% performing at least two additional finger pricks to complete the testing algorithm. HCWs differed in their perceptions of whether results should be returned to clients.

Conclusion: This study assessed HCW experiences using point-of-care RTRIs for HIV recent infection surveillance. Overall, HCWs perceived RTRIs to be acceptable, easy-to-use, and valuable. Though only clients with new HIV diagnoses are tested for recent infection, additional time may be substantial at high-volume health service delivery points. Providing response plans or aggregated recent infection results to HCWs and/or clients may support motivation and sustainability of this novel surveillance activity.

Keywords: Acceptability; Feasibility; HIV; Healthcare workers; Point-of-care test, recent infection surveillance, RTRIs; Surveillance systems.

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Conflict of interest statement

As an inventor of a HIV rapid test for recent infection and as per policy of US government, B.P. receives royalties from the sale of this assay. There are no patents relating to this assay. This does not alter the authors’ adherence to all AIDS policies on sharing data and materials. No other authors have conflicts of interests to declare that are relevant to the content of this article.

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